Principal Solution Engineer (Pre Sales)

About Spyne

Spyne is building the AI operating system for automotive retail. We started with visual merchandising, expanded into conversational AI, and are now putting AI agents across the dealership so dealers move inventory faster, respond to buyers instantly and run more of their operation with AI. Founded by operators from Amazon, Cox and OYO, Spyne has grown 30x in under 3 years and powers 1,500+ dealerships across the US. We're backed by Accel, Vertex Ventures and Storm Ventures.

What we're building:

• Studio AI (Visual Agents): turns a smartphone capture into a complete, publish-ready listing, so cars reach the website faster.
• Vini AI (Conversational Agents): answers every call, chat and text across sales and service, and writes outcomes back into the dealer's DMS and CRM. We’re building a family of agents for recall, receptionist, reputation, acquisition, sales and service, built for dealers to try and turn on themselves.
• AI Contact Service: Vini at the core with a human BDC team around it, delivering the outcomes dealers expect from an in-house BDC.
• DealerOS: the layer that brings it all together. It sits above the dealer's existing software (DMS, CRM, inventory, website, service) and runs agents across the vehicle journey, from sourcing to sale to service.

Spyne is emerging as one of the category leaders redefining how dealerships operate in the AI era. See DealerOS in action: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gjehUZhJi3k

Role snapshot

The Principal Solution Engineer owns the technical win on Spyne's largest US dealer-group and enterprise deals - from first discovery call to a clean handover into Onboarding.

Title: Principal Solution Engineer (Presales)

Team: Sales and Revenue - Solutions Engineering

Reports to: Head of Sales

Location: Gurgaon (Onsite), US Business Hours with Eastern/Central overlap; periodic US travel to dealer groups and events

Level: Principal IC; may lead 2-4 SEs as the function scales based on performance

Works with: Account Executives, Sales leadership, Product, Engineering, Onboarding / Customer Success

Core responsibilities: The Deal Cycle You Own

You own five stages of every qualified deal, in this order. Each stage has a defined output that the next stage depends on.

Discovery - understand the dealership before showing anything

• Lead structured discovery with dealer principals, GMs, used-car managers, BDC and internet managers, marketing heads and dealer-group IT.
• Map the current vehicle lifecycle: acquisition, recon, photography, listing, lead response, appointment, sale, service.
• Quantify pain in dealer terms: time-to-line (days from acquisition to live listing), photo turnaround, lead response time, missed after-hours leads, appointment show rate, cost per sold unit, aged inventory.
• Document the current stack: DMS (CDK, Reynolds & Reynolds, Dealertrack, Tekion), CRM (VinSolutions, DealerSocket, Elead), website provider, inventory feeds and marketplaces (Cars.com, AutoTrader, CarGurus, Facebook).
• Qualify technical fit and flag disqualifiers early; agree a written mutual success plan with the AE.

Demos - show their workflow, not our feature list

• Build tailored demos using the prospect's own VINs, inventory photos and lead scenarios.
• Demo Studio AI and Vini AI together as one inventory-to-sale story, adjusted for franchise vs independent, single store vs group.
• Run live, role-specific sessions for executives (ROI), operators (daily workflow) and IT (integration, security, data flow).
• Handle objections on accuracy, brand consistency, AI conversation quality, compliance (TCPA, consent) and switching cost.

Scoping - define exactly what will be delivered

• Scope rooftops, modules, volumes (vehicles per month, lead volume), integrations, data feeds and custom requirements.
• Design and run pilots / proofs of concept with written success criteria, owners and a fixed end date.
• Size implementation effort and timelines with Onboarding; validate any non-standard ask with Product and Engineering before it is promised.
• Build the business case and ROI model with the AE for the economic buyer.

Solution document - the single source of truth for the deal

• Author the solution design for every deal above the enterprise threshold: business objectives, current vs future-state workflow, modules and configuration, integration architecture, data flows, assumptions, out-of-scope items, risks and success metrics.
• Own technical sections of RFPs, security questionnaires and order-form exhibits.
• Get sign-off from the customer's operational and technical owners before contract.

Handover to Onboarding - zero loss of context

• Run a formal internal handover: solution document, success criteria, stakeholder map, integration checklist, open risks and commitments made in the sale.
• Join the customer kickoff to introduce Onboarding and restate scope and success metrics.
• Stay on point for technical escalations through go-live; review first 30-day adoption against the scoped success criteria.

Senior presales responsibilities

Beyond individual deals, a Principal SE raises the win rate of the whole revenue team.

Strategic deal leadership

• Act as technical lead on the top 10-15 opportunities each quarter: dealer groups, OEM and distributor programmes, marketplace and platform partnerships.
• Build account-level solution strategy and multi-year expansion paths (rooftop rollout, module cross-sell).
• Engage C-level and dealer-principal audiences as a credible automotive retail advisor, not a product presenter.
• Lead competitive positioning against merchandising, conversational AI, website and CRM vendors; maintain win/loss insight.

Presales assets and standards

• Own the demo environment, demo scripts and reusable demo data sets.
• Create and maintain discovery frameworks, solution document templates, ROI calculators, reference architectures and the security/RFP answer library.
• Define the pilot playbook: entry criteria, success metrics, timeline and conversion path.

Enablement and team building

• Coach AEs and junior SEs on discovery, demo craft and technical objection handling; run deal reviews and demo certifications.
• Onboard new revenue hires on product, integrations and the dealer workflow.
• Help hire and build out the SE function as Spyne scales in the US.

Voice of the customer

• Feed structured field insight into Product: feature gaps, integration requests, deal-blocking issues, with revenue attached.
• Partner with Product Marketing on launches, positioning and sales collateral.
• Represent Spyne at industry events (e.g. NADA, Digital Dealer) and on customer advisory sessions.

Forecasting and governance

• Provide a technical-win view on every committed deal in the forecast.
• Track presales capacity, deal coverage and pilot outcomes; report to the CRO.
• Protect margin and delivery: no unscoped commitments, no custom work without sign-off.

How success is measured

The role is judged on technical wins, deal quality and how cleanly deals land in delivery. Targets are set with the CRO in the first 30 days.

• Technical win rate: Share of SE-engaged opportunities where Spyne is the technical choice
• SE-influenced ARR: New and expansion ARR on deals with SE ownership
• Pilot-to-paid conversion: Pilots that convert to contract within the agreed window
• Sales cycle length: Days from discovery to signature on enterprise deals
• Solution document coverage: Share of enterprise deals signed with an approved solution document
• Handover quality: Onboarding sign-off on handover; scope changes or escalations in the first 60 days
• Time-to-value: Days from signature to go-live against the scoped plan
• Enablement output: Assets shipped, AEs certified on demo and discovery

First 90 days

• 30 days: learn the product, dealer workflow and integration stack; shadow live deals; audit current demo, discovery and handover practice.
• 60 days: own technical lead on active enterprise deals; ship the discovery framework, solution document template and handover checklist.
• 90 days: run the full deal cycle independently; launch the pilot playbook and demo environment; first AE enablement cohort complete.

What you bring

Must have

• 8-10+ years in B2B SaaS, with 6+ years in presales / solution engineering, including enterprise and multi-stakeholder deals.
• Track record as technical lead on six-figure ARR deals with US customers.
• Hands-on mastery of discovery, value-based demos, pilot design and solution documentation.
• Strong grasp of integrations: APIs, webhooks, data feeds, SSO, and how SaaS fits into a customer's existing stack.
• Executive presence: can run a room of dealer principals, operators and IT in the same meeting.
• Excellent written English - solution documents and RFP responses that a buyer can sign off on as written.
• Comfortable working US hours overlap and travelling to the US.

Strongly preferred

• SAAS selling experience in global markets specially US market.
• Experience selling AI products - conversational AI, computer vision or generative AI - and explaining accuracy, guardrails and compliance.
• Has worked in a startup enviornment.
• Familiarity with automotive compliance and consent (TCPA, CAN-SPAM) and security reviews (SOC 2).
• Understanding of Integrations, landscape, API's.

How you work

• Customer outcome first; says no to the wrong scope.
• Writes things down; leaves every deal better documented than found.
• Moves fast in a scaling company and builds process only where it removes friction.

What we offer

• A principal-level seat shaping how Spyne sells to the largest US dealer groups and OEMs.
• Direct line to the Head of Sales, and close partnership with Onboarding, Product and Engineering.
• Competitive fixed pay plus a variable component tied to technical-win and ARR targets.
• Room to build and lead the Solutions Engineering function as it grows.